Traditions: Multicultural Literature and the Inquiry Approach for the Primary Grades

This unit offers primary-grade teachers an example of how an interdisciplinary inquiry approach with a multicultural picture book text set might be integrated with existing curricula materials to effectively implement the Common Core State Standards (National Governors Association Center for Best Practices [NGA Center] & Council of Chief State School Officers [CCSSO], 2010; CCSS) for U.S. elementary school children. It is designed for students in K through 2 settings, but for the purpose of citing standards and providing leveled text, examples are focused on second grade. It is in second grade that students are transitioning into reading with greater text complexity and are provided with challenging texts to read independently. The unit lessons are delivered over a period of four weeks during a 90-minute instructional period, whereby content standards instruction will be integrated throughout the reading/language arts activities. Each week instruction will be guided by an essential question to allow students to use an inquiry approach in their learning. The questions for the first three weeks will lead toward the students gaining insight that will enable them to answer the overarching essential question: “Why are traditions important to us?” To build toward that understanding, the following subordinate questions will be addressed weekly: